Three Beautiful Things 01/19/14: Isaiah 49:1-7, Tillich's Insight that Sin is Separation, Yakking with Young People

1.  LeeAnn got a hold of me to say that because she is ill, she couldn't serve as lector this morning and asked me to take her place.  I said I would and I got to read another stirring passage from Isaiah.  It's Isaiah 49: 1-7 and, in it, Isaiah utters the kind of cry of bewilderment and doubt and pain that is heard by a variety of figures throughout the Old Testament: 

I have labored in vain,
I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity;
yet surely my cause is with the LORD,
and my reward with my God.

Here's how I experience this passage:  Isaiah's certainty lies in his suffering, in how his efforts feel futile.  He's less sure about God.  He wants to believe that his "cause is with the Lord" and "my reward with my God", but he is not as sure of this as he is certain that all he's done feels useless.

It's the moments of existential doubt and deep angst that occur throughout the Bible that I find the most illuminating in my day to day experience of living in God. 

2.  Speaking of the existential, LeeAnn's illness meant I was on my own to lead today's session in the four week course LeeAnn and I are giving on existentialism and Christianity.  Over a dozen people attended today's class and we had a scintillating discussion of Paul Tillich's sermon "Your Are Accepted" as we worked among ourselves to better understand Tillich's assertion that sin is separation from others, ourselves, and the Ground of Being and grace is acceptance.  As our session went on today, we worked together to fill the room with insight, questions, and stories.  I was grateful for the appreciation we had of one another's perspectives and points of view. I left the church fired up, confident the course is a good thing.   Next week:  a ten paragraph passage on freedom and responsibility by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

3.  The Deke and I met at 16 Tons and then had a light bite to eat at the Bier Stein and we had a great time talking about a bunch of stuff with each other and had an especially great time talking about stuff with the youngsters who were working at 16 Tons and with the woman sitting next to the Deke at the bar at the Bier Stein.  These people, like so many of their peers I get to listen to at LCC and when I'm out and about, were fascinating as we discussed art, movies, employment, NYC, music, parents who are ill, books, food, beer/cocktails, and other stuff.